Before the internet, there was mail-order and C.O.D.

Years ago, I would leaf through the back of Popular Mechanics, Popular Science, and Mechanics Illustrated magazines and wonder over the nifty items that were available through mail-order.

I always wanted the GIANT weather balloon from Edmunds Scientific, or the Struck kit Mini-Dozer but couldn't afford either of them. Instead, I opted to purchase (at a suspiciously low price) collectible coins from the Littleton Coin Company. Of course, I didn't tell my mom I was doing this and I certainly didn't even begin understand what an approval service was.

So in four to six weeks, I received the coins. And then in another four to six weeks, a second batch arrived with a bill, and then another and another. I was afraid to tell my mom but I couldn't keep hiding these bills so I eventually had to involve her. She wasn't as upset as I thought she might be, but certainly wasn't very happy about it.

A few years later, I joined the Columbia Record Club and had fun pasting 13 stamps on a card and getting 13 albums for 1 cent. Naturally, greed always has a price and trying to cancel these things is, by design, never a simple task.

Today we have Free credit reports, Free dietary supplements, and the like. I suspect most of them are anything but Free

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Salem Cemetery

My mother's family has its roots in the Egypt Valley area in Ohio. In 1869, a thirteen year old girl, Louisa Catherine Fox was brutally murdered in Egypt Valley by a Thomas Carr, to whom she had been engaged. She ultimately rejected him and ended the relationship. One day as she was walking home from school along Starkey Rd, he ambushed her and took her life. A more complete version of the story can be found here

This was the state of her grave site today. Someone recently toppled the stone and it made me sad to see this sort of desecration. Sure, she isn't there, but still seems to be a cruel dishonor to this child's memory.